Note for non-Australian visitors

In Australia "Liberal" is Right-Wing Neo-Cons; economically liberal, socially repressive, tax the poor to subsidise the rich. Republican is also a good thing, as opposed to being a lackey of the British monarchy.

Sydney Morning Herald: Carbon tax is ‘unconstitutional’, says tax expert
This was the headline of a story run yesterday. Now not everyone is used to speaking this strange new language known as FairFox which is English mixed with Rinehart, so I have translated this story (or the first paragraph, once you have read that, you don’t really need to read any more).

Despite the headline, or the url, the actual title of the page, reading the html source code, is Carbon tax|IPA|Bryan Pape… which translates as, despite what they tell their readers, they know what they are doing. Which is an old News Corpse trick, as long as the information in the story is correct, the headline can be the opposite, because many people don’t read past the headline.

How many people will only read the headline, and walk away believing two things – it is a tax and it is unconstitutional, without questioning who the tax expert is that saying these things. The tax expert, Fairfax points out, further into the story is The University of New England academic and practising barrister, Bryan Pape, has provided legal advice to conservative policy think tank, the Institute of Public Affairs, and here is his bio on the IPA website – ipa.org.au/people/bryan-pape/publications

Now to the body of the story…

A PROMINENT Australian legal expert says he believes
This is how the story starts out, translation: ‘prominent‘ means IPA hired gun, ‘legal expert‘ means IPA hired gun and ‘says he believes‘ suggests he is going for a The Castle defence It’s just… the vibe… of the thing. This is the Fairfox variation on the ABC’s default for beginning news stories with the opposition says, we now have news stories starting with IPA says… is there much difference these days anyway?

the Gillard government’s carbon tax is unconstitutional
This is how the first line continues ‘the Gillard government’s carbon tax’ means come election time, they want everyone to remember the name of the government that gave us this supposed tax. I don’t recall the last time any media outlet in this country referred to the Howard government’s GST. ‘carbon tax‘ means let’s not call it by its correct name, of carbon pricing, instead they are trying to cram the word tax into this story as many times as possible (which was 29 times on that page, screen shot below). ‘unconstitutional’ usually refers to any tax the faceless billionaires don’t want to pay (hint: all of them).

and that the three largest states stand a chance
The first line continues with reference to ‘the three largest states’ referring New South Wales, Queensland and Western Australia, this means someone will have to spend taxpayers money fighting this Federal Government policy, because it sure won’t be IPA, and it won’t be the Liberal Parties that led governments in those states, and it won’t be Nathan Tinkler (NSW), Clive Palmer (QLD) or Gina Rinehart and Twiggy Forrest (WA) – the cost will be borne by the taxpayers in those states, and the legal challenge loses, well there is plenty more money where that came from. ‘stand a chance’ means the IPA aren’t convinced that any court case would be winnable, but they only need to convince the voters and in 18 months we will have a new Abbott-government who will do what IPA tells him.

of successfully overturning the legislation in the event of a High Court challenge
‘in the event of a High Court challenge’ means the IPA is still trying to goad the Liberal premiers of NSW, QLD, WA into paying for a High Court challenge, and even if they don’t they have still muddied the waters in the eyes of the readers – voters. Just because there is a possible legal challenge to anything does not mean the case is winnable, mounting a challenge doesn’t make something unconstitutional, it just means something with money is prepared to spend it on a court case rather than paying that money in tax.

The rest of the article follows on pretty much in the same way, with the exception of the following piece reporting‘federal Labor now trails the Coalition in every state and territory on both primary votes and on a two-party preferred basis’, when in fact Labor lead the 2PP (two party preferred) in South Australia and are 50-50 with the Coalition in Victoria. So apparently South Australia and Victoria have now been excluded from the Commonwealth, well that is okay, no faceless billionaire mining-magnates are based there.

The word tax appeared 29 times on this page. As Vladimir Lenin said A lie told often enough becomes the truth. Also interesting about this page, the editors pick… Abbott PM, just so the voting public get used to seeing those words together.

There are many lies being spread about carbon pricing, usually by those with an agenda, either that or they can’t read.

First of all: it is not being applied yet – any business that claims it is sacking workers or raising prices now because of the carbon pricing, is blatantly lying and ripping off consumers. The pricing goes into affect from 1 July 2012.

Second: Unlike the GST which put a 10% tax on just about everything you buy, with little options for finding non-GST affected products; Carbon pricing will only be on the top 500 polluting companies. If you don’t want to pay for a product which has carbon pricing attached, simple… buy a product that is Less polluting.

If you don’t want to pay carbon pricing, choose products with less impact. Simple. Third: opponents of Carbon pricing say that it is unfair, unlike GST which is fair and balanced. No. The reverse is true. GST disproportionately affects those on lower incomes, who spend a larger proportion of their income on GST taxable products, while those that attract no-GST tend to be luxury items (which had other taxes removed in exchange for the GST). If you don’t want to pay carbon pricing, choose products with less impact. Simple. If you want to continue to screw-up the environment, that is your choice. But you pay for the privilege.

Our planet should belong to all of us, not just those who can afford to pollute it. As it is now, those who can afford to buy more things, are doing a greater proportion of damage to our air, our water, our limited resources, our planet, our life-support system. That would like saying: it is okay for a rich person to beat the stuffing out of you, because if you can afford to sue them, they have can afford the compensation. Ignoring the damage done in the meantime.

Fourth: But what about our pensioners? They worked hard all their lives and now they won’t be able to afford heating or food? WRONG. Those on low-incomes, including pensioners will be compensated. And like each and every one of us, as consumers they have a mighty power, it’s called the dollar vote – the power of choice, if they don’t want to pay for the carbon price, all they have to do is choose a different product.

Fifth: Prime Minister Gillard is not personally benefiting from this – We Are. Our children, our grandchildren, our nation, our Pacific neighbours whose countries are disappearing under water, even as I type.

Australia has about 0.3% of the world’s population, but contributes about 1.5% of total greenhouse gas emissions. This puts Australians among the highest per capita emitters (source: Australian Bureau of Statistics). We are the country that is creating the mess, it is our responsibility to clean it up.

The Australian has aggressively opposed the Green Party’s agenda of addressing climate change through greater regulation and taxation of pollution. Two years ago, the paper vowed in an editorial that it would seek to destroy the party at the ballot box.

text by @redglitterx
use of Sir Henry Parkes image, or the coin, is in no way intended to imply that Parkes, or the treasury would in any way endorse the contents of this post or blog